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From the stack: 12 REASONS WHY I LOVE HER

September 24, 2006 by

12 Reasons Why I Love Her (Oni) has a lot going for it. Jamie S. Rich and Joëlle Jones have carefully crafted something that feels very real. Maybe it feels a little too real for my tastes, but more on that later.

First, I have to mention the structure. The book is composed of vignettes of the romantic relationship of Gwen and Evan, two urban twenty-somethings. Rich and Jones have abandoned conventional chronological order for emotional sequence. The individual moments of Gwen and Evan’s relationship are laid out in a way that maximizes cumulative effect.

But the book’s structure doesn’t distract from the content. It doesn’t seem like mere cleverness, a reader comprehension test. It’s unconventional, but it’s a natural fit for the emotional arc that Rich and Jones have built.

Then, there are Jones’s illustrations. Like the narrative order, they suit the material without overwhelming it. She conveys body language and facial expressions with lovely precision, but she avoids any tendency to overstate. She doesn’t restrict herself to conventionally realistic depiction, either. The style varies from straightforward to expressionistic depending on the vignette, and she peppers the pages with appealing, shôjo-esque touches.

The script is much the same, largely conversational but heightened in small ways. The voices of the characters are distinct and specific, and the tones of their conversations are suited to the individual moments being depicted. Those tones range from playful flirtation to raw confrontation, but the voices hold within that wide range. Gwen and Even always sound like themselves.

Rich and Jones have successfully crafted a work that feels very believable without lapsing into the mundane. Their protagonists and their world are entirely credible. Maybe they’re too much so. In an interview at Broken Frontier, Rich expressed the following sentiment:

“My initial concept was trying to imagine my ideal couple for a romantic story. I am kind of a sap and I really enjoy romantic movies, and I think they live or die based on how much you like the two people falling in love. The movie could be clichéd and kind of crappy, but if you have a genuine affection for the actors, you get into it anyway and want them to be together. I wanted Gwen and Evan to be that perfect couple.”

I agree with him. Unfortunately, my dislike for Evan, carefully created as he is, is fairly intense.

Evan’s behavior demonstrates an all-too-familiar blend of insecurity and aggression. When Gwen makes a sweet, unconventional gesture towards him, he fixates on the ways it makes his own efforts seem inadequate. He shifts conversational goalposts, lightly tossing off a serious question and then becoming hostile when Gwen’s reaction doesn’t meet his expectations. Instead of dealing with points of conflict directly, he creates further opportunities for Gwen to disappoint him.

All of this makes Evan cohere into a believable, real character, though not an especially likeable one. Gwen has her own foibles and failings, but it’s still entirely possible to wish her happiness in her current state. I can’t extend that wish to Evan, because he’s too immature.

And that constitutes a fatal flaw for me as a reader. Despite the craft and imagination that Rich and Jones have poured into 12 Reasons, I simply don’t care if one of their protagonists is happy in love, because I don’t necessarily believe he’s capable of that yet.

(This review is based on a preview proof provided by Oni Press.)

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From the stack: SECRET COMICS JAPAN

September 17, 2006 by

Cracking open a copy of Secret Comics Japan: Underground Comics Now, my first thought was, “Wait, Viz published this?” Don’t get me wrong. I love a lot of the books in Viz’s various imprints, but if this is the kind of stuff they were publishing six years ago, somebody get me a time machine.

Edited by Chikao Shiratori, the book collects an eye-popping mixture of shorts with an experimental, Garo-esque flavor. In assembling the stories, Shiratori wanted to offer an alternative to the magic girls and young men with a dream who dominated much of the translated manga at the time.

The cumulative effect is dazzling. There’s a rich range of styles on display, from the adorably disgusting Junko Mizuno to the stylish, cinematic josei of Kiriko Nananan to the bizarrely detailed Usamaru Furuya. Narrative structures run from utterly straightforward to thoroughly abstract, and the subject matter is similarly diverse.

Each piece contributes something different to the big picture that Shiratori is trying to assemble. Diversity is a difficult concept to illustrate in a meaningful way, but Secret Comics Japan offers an absorbing cross section of ambitious weirdness.

Shintaro Kago’s “Punctures” is both visually revolting and hilarious. In it, society has become so paranoid about the possibility of injury that they’re resorting to preemptive self-mutilation. In a world where restaurants are forced to warn you that the contents of your coffee cup are hot, it’s depressingly plausible, even if Kago takes the notion to grotesque extremes.

Benkyo Tamaoki takes a surprisingly slice-of-life approach to erotica in “Editor Woman.” As Shiratori says in his introduction to the piece, Tamaoki produces “high quality manga that also happen to be porn.” The title character is painfully normal, and Tamaoki packs the story with mundane details and petty frustrations that somehow manage not to counter the story’s function as erotica.

My favorite selection in the book is easily Furuya’s “Palepoli,” gloriously weird, beautifully illustrated one-page cartoons. They’re disturbing, profane, and hilarious. (“Golgo 31” is one of the funniest things I’ve read in years.) I’ve really got to order his Short Cuts.

There’s glorious stuff in here, and fans of Digital Manga Publishing’s Robot series would do well to try and track down a copy. It’s an amazing collection of the kind of styles and stories you don’t generally see on the shelves at Borders.

(I ordered this from Viz’s on-line shop, but it’s also in stock at Amazon. Other books by some of the creators with work in Secret Comics Japan include: Tamaoki’s Blood: The Last Vampire; Mizuno’s Princess Mermaid and Pure Trance; Nananan’s Sweet Cream and Red Strawberries and Blue; and others I was too lazy to research.)

Filed under: From the stack, Viz 14 Comments

From the stack: THE DRIFTING CLASSROOM Vol. 1

September 13, 2006 by

Don’t walk; run. Don’t speak; shout. Don’t cry; wail until your throat is raw. These are some of the guiding principles of Kazuo Umezu’s The Drifting Classroom, a horror classic that’s been licensed as part of Viz’s Signature line.

People who have rejected manga based on its reflective tendencies and leisurely pace won’t have anything to worry about here. Umezu’s tale of the students and teachers of a suburban elementary school mysteriously transported to a menacing wasteland moves at an insane clip. Describing anything as a roller-coaster ride is beyond cliché, but it applies here, assuming lengths of track are missing and the coaster has been built over an active volcano.

I’m reluctant to describe any of the book’s plot beyond a bare-bones summary, because I think the thrill of it comes from the shocks that arrive on just about every page. Umezu doesn’t dwell on the hows of his story; the school has disappeared, and that’s all that matters. The Drifting Classroom concentrates instead on the ensuing panic and its influence on human behavior.

And that behavior is genuinely shocking. The children are desperate for some kind of guidance or comfort, and the adults are far too out of their depth to provide it, though they try to go through the motions. Hysteria manifests in anger and violence. No one knows what’s happening or what to do, and the ordinary order of the school dissolves in terrifying ways.

I admit that I laughed several times while reading The Drifting Classroom. I think it was laughter born of disbelief. “Did I actually just read that? Did Umezu actually just draw that?” I did, and he did. It’s pure madness, and it almost never rests.

Despite the fact that it was originally released in 1972, there’s nothing particularly quaint about the book. It looks less like a manga that was ahead of its time when published as it does a weirdly brilliant contemporary pastiche of its original period.

In a text piece at the end, author Patrick Macias notes that The Drifting Classroom came after the period where Umezu’s work was strongly influenced by Osamu Tezuka. I still think there’s a great deal of Tezuka here. (I wouldn’t have been surprised to see Astro Boy come soaring into the school’s playground, though I’m fairly sure no good would have come of it if he had.)

But it’s Tezuka providing the architecture for Umezu’s own style. Umezu takes the open faces of children and crumples them with suspicion, grief and rage. He takes the stalwart composure of adults and undermines it with bewildered panic. Thick speed lines are used to illustrate terror instead of adventure.

The Drifting Classroom is unquestionably one of the weirdest manga I’ve ever read, but it’s also one of the most exciting. Umezu has crafted a nightmare out of disturbing but believable human behavior.

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From the stack: BENKEI IN NEW YORK

September 8, 2006 by

In my experience, manga assassins either look exactly like what they are (Golgo 13) or the exact opposite (Anne Freaks, Bambi and Her Pink Gun). The title character of Benkei in New York (Viz) looks like your uncle, or the guy who files your insurance claim. He could be the manager of your bank or someone who sells suits.

He isn’t, obviously, but the pleasure of the book is the disconnection between how things look and how they are.

Written by Jinpachi Mori and drawn by Jiro Taniguchi, Benkei in New York follows a Japanese artist living in Manhattan through a series of stand-alone stories about revenge. Benkei isn’t one of those crassly commercial hit men who’ll kill anyone for a price. He needs certainty that his client’s desire for retribution is just, at least by his standards.

It’s never even entirely clear if murder is Benkei’s main gig. He’s an accomplished artist and an even more gifted forger. After glancing at a masterpiece a couple of times, he can reproduce it perfectly. Mori finds clever ways for art and death to intersect.

For readers who only know Taniguchi through work published by Fanfare/Ponent Mon (The Walking Man, Times of Botchan), Benkei might come as something of a surprise. Taniguchi’s detailed precision translates perfectly into noir, and his bland, everyman design for Benkei is brilliant. Unlike Anna or Bambi, whose visual innocence functions as a kind of tip-off, you really wouldn’t know what Benkei is capable of to look at him. He’s kind of dumpy, and he has a blandly amiable expression.

Taniguchi can’t seem to resist the impulse to make any moment, either everyday or violent, beautiful. The action sequences can be faintly ludicrous (a swordfight in a museum, improvisational weaponry made from seafood), but Taniguchi’s painstaking detail and meticulous composition sell them.

I’m generally suspect when creators try and sell a criminal as a good guy, but Mori and Taniguchi don’t sell the idea too hard. Benkei has a specific morality, and it’s intriguing, but there’s no explicit endorsement of what he does or why. They’re content to present it, and it’s an effective foundation for the pulpy stories collected here.

(Yes, I’m on something of a “books I bought for cheap directly from Viz” kick. Like Rumic Theater, Benkei in New York is still in the bargain bin.)

Filed under: From the stack, Viz 3 Comments

From the stack: RUMIC THEATER

September 6, 2006 by

Much as I love sprawling, multi-volume manga, I have a real fondness for short stories as well. Instead of finding it off-putting to find that a volume of a favorite series has an unrelated short in the back, I’m usually delighted because it shows the creator’s abilities in a different light.

That’s one of the reasons I’m so fond of Rumiko Takahashi’s Rumic Theater (Viz), a charming collection of short stories from the creator of hits like Maison Ikkoku. The main reason, though, is the opportunity it provides to see Takahashi tell small, sweet, stand-alone tales.

Don’t get me wrong. Maison Ikkoku is wonderful. But my favorite parts are when it seems like a small, self-contained tale has been placed in the larger context, almost independent of the ongoing will-they-won’t-they comedy. That’s all Rumic Theater is.

Apartment dwellers try and conceal the presence of a penguin from their pet-averse neighbors. A family is plagued by the misconception that their house is a garbage pick-up location. An elderly woman returns from the brink of death with remarkable powers. Wackiness often ensues, but misunderstandings are cleared away, and the characters find honest, warm ways to connect.

It’s vintage Takahashi, in other words. The shorts are a great showcase for her trademark wit and warmth. As always, her characters are stylized but look real and human, even in the extremities of comic distress.

So if you’re mourning the conclusion of Maison Ikkoku and need a Takahashi fix, consider Rumic Theater. It’s a great way to enjoy her work in small but satisfying doses.

(I ordered this book directly from Viz during a sale at their on-line shop. It’s still available and still discounted. The Viz rep I spoke to said it’s also still in print.)

Filed under: From the stack, Viz 4 Comments

From the stack: KLEZMER

August 30, 2006 by

There are certain comics that carry tremendous nostalgia for me. The squeaky teens of the Archie books and the adorable deformities of the Harvey roster take me back to long childhood hours in the station wagon headed from Cincinnati to Massachusetts or Missouri. When I think of super-heroes, images by Johns Buscema, Romita, and Byrne and George Pérez illustrate those thoughts.

In spite of relatively limited exposure to his work (The Rabbi’s Cat, Vampire Loves, a short in Japan as Viewed by 17 Creators), Joann Sfar has managed to make his way onto the list of creators whose work I feel like I’ve been happily reading forever. There are plenty of cartoonists whose work I admire and will happily seek out, but there’s something special about Sfar.

The imminent arrival of Klezmer (First Second) provides another opportunity to figure out exactly what that special quality is. It’s the first installment of a story of a ragtag group of musicians who find their way together through a shared focus on traditional Jewish songs. In it, Sfar covers familiar territory – faith, the intersection of cultures, love, death, and art.

As with his other works, there’s no apparent precision to Sfar’s storytelling. He has a tendency to wander off point and riff on subjects seemingly as they strike him. The tendency can manifest itself as a surprisingly tender and romantic look at the history of Odessa or a who’s-on-first exchange about life after the Yeshiva. But the wanderings end up contributing to the whole. In a Sfar book, you can learn as much or more about the characters when they aren’t talking about themselves as when they are.

And the cast is linked in their shared flight. The band leader saw his companions murdered. The singer is avoiding the inevitability of an arranged marriage. Two have been thrown out of their respective yeshivas. The guitarist almost died at the end of a rope.

Each is ambivalent about the world around them and the sudden arrival of companions as they travel through it. For some, klezmer is a recent discovery. It’s a useful way to make some money or simply the thing that they’ve decided to do next after their original plans fell apart. But the music and the act of performing it has the power to sneak up on them. It’s something they and their audiences can share, even if it isn’t the product of their culture or if it holds no particular nostalgia for them.

It all unfolds in a lovely way that’s both casual and powerful. More than just about any other comic creator I can think of, Sfar folds in big ideas without ever turning them into Big Ideas. His observations can be absolutely scathing, but they don’t curdle things; the tone of Klezmer is ultimately expansive, even if individual moments can be bleak.

His illustrations, done in watercolors, are perfectly in synch with the story he’s telling. Sfar’s visual style is distinct but incredibly versatile. It can be simplistic, even crude, and wonderfully expressive at the same moment.

I’m still not precisely sure how Sfar has managed to make such an impression on me so quickly. It’s enough that he always creates inviting, imaginative worlds to visit, places that are both warmly familiar and surprising.

(This review is based on a complimentary copy provided by the publisher.)

Filed under: First Second, From the stack 3 Comments

From the stack: AMERICAN BORN CHINESE

August 27, 2006 by

In a lot of juvenile fiction, the moral is the same: “Be yourself.” Don’t compromise your beliefs or values for some artificial notion of success or popularity. The moral sounds good on paper and on film, and it’s good advice in general.

Of course, these fictions are often constructed in such a way that there really isn’t any other sensible choice. Being yourself may not be the easiest path, but it’s clearly the most rewarding one. You may not score the flashy outcomes, but the really important ones –true friends, romance, self-respect, the Mathalon trophy – are within your grasp.

Reality is much messier, obviously. No matter what your age, “be yourself” isn’t always intuitively useful advice. And there are always instances where others are all too happy to make assumptions on precisely who the real you is based on the flimsiest (or laziest) of pretexts.

There’s an undeniable thread of “Be yourself” running through Gene Yang’s American Born Chinese (First Second), but he frames it with so much wit and frankness that it never seems simplistic or cliché. It’s a bracingly funny look at racism (both blatant and internalized).

He breaks the book into three stories. In the first, the Monkey King thinks his stature and accomplishments rank him as an equal among the supernatural pantheon. (The pantheon disagrees.) In the second, Jin struggles with the burdens and assumptions of being “the Chinese kid” in an overwhelmingly white school. The third is a grotesque sitcom where bland young Danny’s every step towards popularity is undone by the annual visit of Cousin Chin-Kee, a horrific amalgamation of Chinese stereotypes.

Each of the concurrent stories has its own style, from revisionist fable to coming-of-age slice of life to nightmare with canned laughter. The styles support each other, as do the stories. They accumulate into a larger view of the ways cultural and individual influences intersect and conflict. Yang’s artistic style is appealingly simple and clear throughout.

The formal intersection of the three stories isn’t entirely effective, and the ending seems a bit rushed. It’s hard to see how it could have been otherwise, because Yang isn’t telling the kind of story that can really be concluded neatly, if at all.

There’s tough, challenging material here, and Yang doesn’t diminish it by delivering it with a general lightness of tone. If anything, the comic warmth of the book makes the sharper moments more effective. Should you really have laughed at that? Would you in a different context?

(This review was based on a complimentary copy provided by the publisher. Yang has written a series of posts about American Born Chinese at First Second’s blog.)

Filed under: First Second, From the stack 1 Comment

From the stack: JOURNEY INTO MOHAWK COUNTRY

August 26, 2006 by

There are times when a terrific idea for a graphic novel doesn’t result in a terrific comic. I think Journey into Mohawk Country (First Second Books) is one of those instances, though the book has a lot going for it.

George O’Connor has illustrated a journal written by Harmen Meyndertsz Van den Bogaert, a Dutch trader setting off from Fort Orange (now Albany, N.Y.) into Iroquois territory. Van den Bogaert and his two companions are on something of a goodwill mission, hoping to expand fur trade with the Iroquois and gather information on French expansion into the region.

I love the concept behind the book – translating a primary historical source into a contemporary visual format. Obviously it’s not the only current project to take this approach, and it certainly isn’t the one with the highest profile. But it is an intriguing addition to the roster of ways graphic novel creators are re-conceiving non-fiction content.

I’m a big fan of books in this category. I love the energy and goofy wit of the Action Philosophers books (Evil Twin). The morbid precision of Rick Geary’s Treasury of Victorian Murder series is always good, shivery company. Ande Parks and Chris Samnee were audacious with Capote in Kansas, their graphic novelization of the creation of a non-fiction novel. And Jim Ottaviani assembled a who’s who of creators for Dignifying Science to tell the stories of groundbreaking women scientists.

But with Journey into Mohawk Country, my interest in the concept outweighs my interest in the content. Van de Bogaert did not seem to be writing for posterity, providing instead a somewhat dry recounting of the events of his travels. Pieces like this – letters, legers, maps, journals – contribute to the tapestry of history, but the interest for me is their context, or what they say about a point in time.

O’Connor resists the urge to contextualize Van de Bogaert’s experiences, which is both admirable and problematic. He’s respecting his source material, contributing only slight embroideries to Van de Bogaert’s account in the form of little grace notes of feeling. But that respect also leaves the narrative shapeless. It’s odd to be levying criticisms at a writer who never intended for his words to be purposed in this particular way, but that’s the conundrum of the book.

I like O’Connor’s illustrations, which are generally lively and expressive. They’re not so exaggerated or stylized that they contradict the source material, nor are they so static that they seem like illustrations accompanying a text. They create a solid sense of place, and O’Connor doesn’t entirely resist the urge to indulge in some visual flights of fancy. (I did find myself distracted by one bit character design, though it could just be me. I think the illustrated Van de Bogaert bears an uncanny resemblance to Zonker Harris.)

Colors by Hilary Sycamore serve the book well. She captures the wintry palette of the countryside and the fireside glow of the Mohawk communities. It runs towards the monochromatic at times, but that might reflect the reluctance to embroider on the reality being portrayed. As with all First Second books, Journey into Mohawk Country is beautifully designed.

In the final analysis, I’m of two minds about the book. The narrative doesn’t really engage me, but I want to see more books in this vein based on more gripping source material. As an individual graphic novel, I think Journey into Mohawk Country has tremendous potential value as an educational tool. Not only does it provide a specific and personal window into a period of history, it’s an exciting example of imaginative ways to communicate history.

(This review is based on a complimentary copy provided by the publisher.)

Filed under: First Second, From the stack 4 Comments

From the stack: GET A LIFE

August 19, 2006 by

In her review of You, Me and Dupree at The New York Times, Manohla Dargis notes the peculiar cinematic fondness for thirty-ish men who refuse to grow up. Film (and comics) can be “a virtual playpen for legions of slobbering big babies for whom Peter Pan isn’t a syndrome but a way of life,” as Dargis puts it.

One of the things that makes Philippe Dupuy and Charles Berberian’s Get a Life (Drawn & Quarterly) such a pleasure is that it isn’t about growing up so much as getting older. Mr. Jean, their endearingly average, slightly dyspeptic protagonist, is hovering around thirty, and he isn’t entirely happy about it.

But he isn’t obsessed with it or terrified by the prospect. He’s got a reasonable amount of success at work. His personal life isn’t a wasteland; he’s got friends and romantic companionship. If life isn’t perfect and a major milestone of years is looming, things could certainly be worse. In other words, Mr. Jean is in an age-appropriate place, and that’s refreshing.

Dupuy and Berberian, who divide their duties as creators equally, strike a wonderfully balanced tone in their stories. They’re witty without ever becoming arch and warm without being cloying. As Mr. Jean moves through the highs and lows of everyday life, he encounters friends, family, and neighbors who all provide distinct comforts and frustrations. Chance encounters trigger memories that can be both painful and nostalgic. Each story is a snapshot of a life that feels very real.

The illustrations are very much of a piece with the stories. Character designs are funny and charming but not too exaggerated. Mr. Jean’s body language works particularly well, attuned to all of his many moods. He can be slumped with defeat or exhaustion, rigid with frustration, and even (rarely) comfortably at ease with the way his life is going.

It’s a tremendously comforting comic. The stories are funny, moving glimpses of the everyday. If I were to quibble with anything, it would be the title. I’d say that Mr. Jean already has a life, and an appealingly grown-up one. But it can be hard to see that while you’re busy living it.

Filed under: Drawn & Quarterly, From the stack 4 Comments

From the stack: CASTLE WAITING

August 6, 2006 by

What do you do if the family you’re born into or the life people expected for you don’t fit? If you’re lucky, you find a place like Castle Waiting. Lucky comics fans can enjoy Linda Medley’s comic of the same name in a beautifully produced new collection from Fantagraphics.

Castle Waiting makes the wonderful argument that new beginnings and second chances are waiting for anyone. It begins with a slightly skewed retelling of the Sleeping Beauty legend. Charming as Medley’s revisions are, they’re really just a way to clear out the conventional fairy-tale figures and make room in the castle for the endearing oddballs who make up Medley’s cast.

First among them is Lady Jain, a pregnant noblewoman for whom “happily ever after” turned out to be anything but. She flees an abusive marriage for the safety of Castle Waiting. Before she even reaches it, she begins to get a sense of her own resourcefulness in some misadventures along the way. When she arrives, she finds the kind of warmth and security that family and home promise but sometimes don’t deliver.

It reminds me strongly (and favorably) of Armistead Maupin’s Tales of the City books. Both celebrate the power of the family of choice and feature rich casts of characters. Medley pulls bits and pieces of classic fairy tales together to build a world as real and endearing as Maupin’s 28 Barbary Lane.

Instead of dwelling on the princesses and wicked queens, Medley populates her world with characters from the fairy-tale margins. The castle was founded by Sleeping Beauty’s abandoned handmaidens, now well into their dotage. It’s occupied by an eclectic group – a fastidious stork, a flirtatious horse-man, a bearded nun – who all offer Jain their own unique forms of friendship and welcome.

Medley focuses on quiet moments that reveal character rather than constructed intersections of fairy-tale tropes. Her small observations about human (or mostly human) nature are always warm and potent, whether the castle residents are celebrating the birth of Jain’s child or just sitting around coloring each others’ hair.

The long sequence starring the bearded nun is easily my favorite, as it embodies so many of Medley’s essential themes. Sister Peace may have taken the vows, but she wasn’t born in a habit, and her path from a girl with facial hair and a restless spirit to woman of substance is funny, twisty, and fascinating. She’s spent a lifetime turning disadvantages into strengths and helping others find their own place in the world, like a one-woman Castle Waiting on the march.

I love Medley’s classic-but-modern style of illustration. She has a particularly splendid way with facial expressions, which are always funny, telling, and real. And Fantagraphics has put Medley’s comics into a beautiful package, courtesy of designer Adam Grano. The book looks like a classic fairy-tale tome, hard-covered and complete with a sewn-in bookmark. It’s the perfect physical vehicle for the story.

I’m always looking for re-readability in comics – stories I can pull down from the shelf and enjoy again and again. With its great characters, charming spirit, and wonderful execution, Castle Waiting has landed squarely on my list of all-time favorites. I can’t wait to catch up with Medley’s world with the new ongoing series.

Filed under: Fantagraphics, From the stack 2 Comments
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